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Because the media isn’t thinking about Spirit’s Target Market. Spirit’s flyers are for the most part young people who are squeezing all they can out of each and every travel dollar. They fly Spirit because Spirit is cheap. These people are not consumer victims; they’re consumer sharks seeking out the best price in a competitive marketplace.

Sure, there might be some people who will be taken by surprise and upset by these fees, but my guess is that Spirit’s Target Market will understand and adapt accordingly. Folks, not every extra fee should be cause for consumer (and government) outrage. As Ryan Air in Europe has shown, giving smart consumers the freedom to decide how and when to spend their hard earned dollars, can lead to great brand success.

The Loser
The SEC must clean up its act —especially if the government wants to make it the central authority for financial reform and regulation.

As if missing Bernie Madoff and the global financial crisis wasn’t bad enough, the SEC is now embroiled in a porn scandal that is —let’s not mince words— simply outrageous, even by the measure of government scandals.

The SEC missed Bernie Madoff. The SEC missed the 2008 global financial crisis and over-leveraged banks. And now we see that its ranks seem to be filled with amateur and professional pornographers. Discipline at the SEC is so lax that even those who committed egregious offenses were merely penalized for a week or two while being paid salaries in excess of $200,000. One employee was even setting up a porn business using SEC time and computer equipment. Another employee was blocked from trying to access sex sites 16,000 times in one month.

Fuggedaboutit. Other government agencies and organizations have had their problems, but few have gone so thoroughly off the tracks as the SEC.

The SEC needs a Crisis Management Plan and a brandover of legendary proportions. The country and the taxpayers deserve it, and if the White House hopes to invest the SEC with new powers, they would be wise to demand it.

In terms of a Crisis Management Plan, the first step is for the SEC to acknowledge that it is in deep trouble and has a long road to recovering its authority and being useful again.

Next the SEC must show that it can and will strenuously regulate itself. This means that it must clean house: get rid of the pornographers and other corrupt elements in its ranks and start rebuilding its regulatory service. Without restoring confidence in its operation among Americans, the SEC cannot regulate others effectively (and everyone agrees that some new approach to financial regulation is needed to counter today’s culture of greed).

What is probably required is for an outside figure who is respected for his or her integrity to step into the top spot at the agency and do the tough work of giving the bad and the incompetent their walking papers. Wall Street and Main Street must be kept apprised of the changes that made at the SEC, and these changes must be promoted as fundamental and positive. Part of this change initiative must be tied to the SEC’s expanded role in any legislation to oversee the finance industry. A name change would also be appropriate to drive home the fact that the SEC has broken with the past. How about the FMA (“Financial Markets Authority”)?

Bottom line, when a brand becomes as toxic as the SEC is now, but still has an important institutional role to play, it is best for all concerned to do everything just short of starting from scratch. The brand re-invention must be promoted as vigorously as possible.

And, remember, things are always easier when you keep marketing and branding in mind.

TODAY'S TANTILLO TAKEAWAY -

Your Target Market must be the gauge of your business decisions, especially when it comes to pricing your goods and services.